The Fi.vixg Dutchman a!vd Voltigeur. 73 



the flying dutchman and voltigeur. 



" The British turf has produced many a pair of famous animals which, Hke Bay Middleton 

 and Elis, Charles the Twelfth and Euclid, Lord Lyon and Savernake, Kaiser and Gang Forward, 

 invariably suggest thoughts and reminiscences of each other. Such will always be the case 

 when the names of the Flying Dutchman and Voltigeur are mentioned with pride ; and 

 although within the last dozen or fifteen years the ' classic races ' have fallen almost without 

 exception to the equine champions of the South, it will be long before two such noble repre- 

 sentatives of the British thoroughbred will be stripped upon a racecourse as were sent by 

 the North to do battle for Epsom's great race in 1849 and 1850. The Flying Dutchman, 

 by Bay Middleton out of Barbette, by Sandbeck, was bred in 1846 by Mr. Vansittart, at 

 Kirkleatham in Yorkshire, but his breeder, who died in 1848, was not spared to witness 

 the Dutchman's triumphs as a three-year-old at Epsom and Doncaster. The colt passed 

 immediately after his birth into the possession of the late Earl of Eglinton, who, after the 

 victories as a two-year-old of the Flying Dutchman's half-brother, Van Tromp, entered into 

 a convention with Mr. Vansittart, binding him to give one thousand guineas for every 

 perfectly-formed foal thrown by Barbette. From the moment when, as a yearling, the 

 Flying Dutchman reached the stables, at Middleham, of Fobert his trainer, it was anticipated 

 with confidence that he would gain the highest honours that it is in the power of the 

 turf to bestow. His fame preceded him to Newmarket, where he was stripped for the first 

 time in public as a competitor for the July stakes, and such was the impression produced 

 by his grand appearance, his faultless action, and by his easy victory upon that occasion, 

 that he was at once backed at five to one for the Derby, and during the intervening 

 eleven months between the July of 1848 and the May of 1849 his backers never for a 

 single day had occasion to regret their spirited investments. The Flying Dutchman was 

 one of those exceptional animals which, at two and three years old, are never sick or sorry 

 for an hour ; and such was the perfection of his respiratory organs that Fobert used to 

 pronounce it impossible to make him blow hard even after a four miles' gallop. He had 

 the misfortune to run both for the Derby and St. Leger when the ground was deep and 

 holding, but his action, which was that of a hunter, and his large feet, enabled him to 

 hold his own in both races. Hotspur ran him close for the Derby, but the St. Leger was 

 never more easily won than when he ' romped home ' in front of Nunnykirk and eight 

 other starters. As a four-year-old he made such an example of his field in the Ascot 

 Cup that Mr. Greville proclaimed him to be the best animal that in his long experience 

 he had ever seen. 



" Nevertheless, it was destined that his colours should for once be lowered, and to the Earl of 

 Zetland's Voltigeur was reserved the honour accorded to the Duke of Wellington by a French 

 print, which was sold for a short time in Paris after the battle of Waterloo, and at the foot of 

 which were printed the significant words, ' II vaincu I'invincible.' Voltigeur, a dark brown horse, 

 standing fifteen hands three inches high — the same colour and the same stature as the Dutchman's — 

 first saw the light in the paddocks, at Hart, in Durham, of Mr. R. Stephenson — the same paddocks 

 which subsequently produced Virago, perhaps the best mare of this century. Voltigeur, the son 

 of Voltaire and Martha Lynn, only started once as a two-}'ear-old, when he had little difficulty 

 in winning the Wright Stakes, at Richmond in Yorkshire. After this race he was purchased 

 by the late Earl of Zetland for one thousand guineas, with the promise of five hundred more 

 if he should win the Derby. The Earl of Zetland thought him heavy-shouldered, but was 

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